CMB is a great place to work for both genders, but, as a woman, I’d like to give you my perspective. Having recently attended the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce’s annual Pinnacle Awards, a luncheon celebrating women leaders in the Boston community, I started to reflect on my own journey in the workforce. The eight women receiving awards that afternoon all had such inspiring stories, most facing some form of adversity, to become leaders in their field and contributors to the Boston community. Fortunately for me, CMB has given me many opportunities to grow and develop professionally, perhaps due in part to the fact that it is a woman-led company. Our President and CEO, Anne Bailey Berman, was herself a recipient of a Pinnacle Award back in 2007 for achievement in entrepreneurship, and CMB was named one of the top women-led businesses in Boston this past year.I joined CMB straight out of college nearly 5 years ago, starting out as an associate researcher. My first impression was that CMB’s culture was an open one in which collaboration between senior and entry-level staff was not only encouraged but considered a critical part of a project’s success. However, you’re not just thrown to the wolves. CMB has a great training program for new associates, teaching all facets of project execution through classroom-setting sessions and on-the-job training through project mentorship from senior associates. There are clear paths for promotion and growth and development opportunities for all levels in weekly “CMB University” sessions. Anne is always telling us to “ask for forgiveness, not permission.” We’re encouraged to have our own voice and contribute strategic thinking from the outset, and after only 3 years, I was promoted from associate to senior associate to project manager.

As a project manager, I have faced new challenges in finding the managing style that works best for me, particularly as a woman. Thanks to Anne’s involvement in the Boston business community as well as her recognition of the importance of the role of women in leadership, I have been presented with examples of strong management and opportunities to attend events that help me find the style that works best for me.

As a group, the women of CMB attend networking breakfasts and co-host WIRE (Women In Research) events. The best opportunity I’ve received so far is being accepted to the Boston Chamber Women’s Leadership Program, which allows me to attend events, seminars, and lectures to learn from my peers and other women leaders in our community. Just this week, our Senior Marketing Manager, Stephanie Kimball, was accepted to Boston’s Future Leaders Program.

So ladies (and gents), if you’re interested in a career in market research, I encourage you to apply here. We have smart people, do important work for world-leading brands, and give back to the community through fundraising and volunteering. There is a true sense of comradery between colleagues here. CMB’s not just a stop along the way, but a place where you can grow your career. This is a place where producing exceptional work is the attainable expectation and every day is a new learning experience.

The Patriots have landed in Phoenix for yet another Super Bowl, but there are still those who can’t stop talking about “Deflategate.” Yes, that’s what some are calling the controversy surrounding those perfectly legal 12.5 PSI inflated footballs that lost air pressure due to changing atmospheric conditions and repeated Gronking* after touchdowns during the first half of the Pats-Colts showdown.

Here in Boston, we were shocked to turn on the TV and hear the terrible accusations. Were we watching and reading the same things as the accusers? Did those doubters not watch the press conferences (all three of them) where our completely ethical coach proclaimed his team’s innocence? Did they not understand that Belichick even conducted a SCIENCE EXPERIMENT?

Or could it be simply that the doubters live outside of New England?

The chart above makes it pretty obvious—from Bangor to Boston, we just might have been hearing the voices of a lot more Pats fans. This is, in fact, a really simple illustration of the dangers of convenience sampling—a very common type of non-probability sampling.

Sure it’s a silly example, but as companies try to conduct research faster and cheaper, convenience sampling poses serious threats. Can you get 500 completes in a day? Yes, but there’s a very good chance they won’t be representative of the population you’re looking for. Posting a link to your survey on Facebook or Twitter is fast and free, but whose voice will you hear and whose will you miss?

I’ve heard it said that some information is better than none, but I’m not sure I agree. If you sample people that aren’t in your target, they can lead you in the completely wrong direction. If you oversample in a certain population (ahem, New Englanders) you can also suffer from a biased, non-representative sample.

Representative sampling is one of the basic tenets of survey research, but just because it’s a simple concept doesn’t mean we can afford to ignore it. Want your results to win big? Carefully review your game plan before kicking-off data collection.

Sample Frame: Is the proposed sample frame representative of the target population?

Unless you are targeting a niche population. . .

online panel “click-throughs” should be census balanced

customer lists must be reflective of the target customers (if the population is all customers, do not use email addresses unless addresses exist for all customers or the exceptions are randomly distributed)

compare the final sample to the target population just to be sure

Selection: Does the selection process ensure that all potential respondents on the frame have an equal chance of being recruited throughout the data collection period?

Never in my life did I think I would be running away from a zombie, but that’s exactly what I did on a recent adventure. I embarked on this journey with eleven of my coworkers and friends. We went to the Room Escape Adventures studio in Charlestown, Massachusetts where we were assigned a complicated task: escape a room with a hungry zombie in it. The zombie was chained to the wall; however, every five minutes, the chain extended, and the zombie got closer and closer with the intent of having us for a full-course dinner. In order to escape the room in one hour, we were left no choice—our survival depended on us working together to follow the clues and solve the puzzles for the key that would lead us to freedom.Failed Flesh or Triumphant Team?

I’m proud to say that we successfully worked together to find the key and escape the room before the hour ended. Mind you, only one-third of the teams who have participated in this challenge have escaped the zombie’s clutches.

What made us a high performing team?

We worked together with one common goal. It was clear that none of us wanted to be the zombie’s dinner, so we quickly regrouped, adapted to the environment, and worked together to achieve a superior result. While we don’t have zombies chasing us here at CMB, the need to work toward a common goal as a group is the same. Our common goal is simple—help our clients achieve success in their markets and potential markets—and we do this through getting our clients to focus on specific business decisions when scoping out research, which ensures superior results are achieved.

We trusted each other and kept the lines of communication open. This challenge allowed us to really think outside of the box, and while some crazy ideas worked, some didn’t. The important thing is that we kept communicating, and we trusted each other enough to try everyone’s outlandish plans, which eventually led us to the key. We value similar things here at CMB—trust, teamwork, and open communication are paramount, and those are the values that drive the rock solid execution for all of our client projects.

We let our passion and talent shine through. My team eagerly went straight to work figuring out the first clue. Each of us has a distinct personality and a diverse set of strengths, so we each found ourselves playing different roles in the effort to escape the room. For example, one of my friends put her organizational skills to work by keeping track of each clue we solved in case past clues were needed again. At CMB, we do the same thing. We work on projects we’re passionate about, and each of us brings our own unique set of skills to the table. This allows us to do world-class research with clients from a variety of industries.

The zombie went home hungry, but the experience reminded me about the importance of teamwork and how these three factors can contribute to a team’s success. At the end of the day, I’m just happy my flesh is intact.

Jordan is an Associate Researcher at CMB. You can catch him at any of the Boston music venues for a concert, lounging on the Jamaica Pond, or actively avoiding the walking dead.

Speaking of teamwork, we would love to have YOU on our team! Check out our open positions:

In February of 2008, I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. That year, my coworkers formed a Light the Night team as a way to rally around me and show their support as I began my two year journey to kick cancer’s butt! The Light the Night Walk is the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s (LLS) annual fundraising event. The walk starts at dusk and everyone carries a lantern that is lit from within. There are three different types of lanterns: a red lantern shows support, a white lantern represents a survivor, and a gold lantern represents the memory of a lost loved one. It pays tribute to those who have fallen to this terrible disease and brings hope to those still battling cancer. This Thursday, CMB will be participating and walking as a team for the seventh year in a row.Since we started the walk, we have raised over $65,000 for LLS. And, in true CMB fashion, we had fun doing it. In the weeks leading up to the walk, we do a variety of events to excite and inform CMBers about LLS and their mission. For example, every year we sell tickets to a lunch courtesy of our resident champion BBQ master, Jared Huizenga. During the lunch, we also hold a silent auction and the items up for sale—homemade lunches, handmade scarves, photo editing sessions, etc.— give my coworkers a chance to showcase their diverse talents.

As a cancer survivor, it means so much to me that something as negative as a cancer diagnosis could result in such a positive movement by CMB. Their participation with the Light the Night Walk is just one example of how my work family helped me through a very difficult time. There were many others: the daily visits from coworkers to help me countdown to the end of chemo and the easy acceptance of my wig, my scarf, or my bald head—whichever I chose to wear that day.

LLS funds research with the goal of curing blood cancers. It provides support to patients and their families, and I (as well as countless others) have personally benefited from this research. Due in no small part to the advances made from this very research, I will celebrate five years in remission next May. I was the recipient of a lifesaving stem cell transplant and proton radiation therapy…and these are just two examples of the advanced therapies now available because of LLS. Thanks to them, I will be holding my white lantern high this Thursday.

From the LLS website: When LLS was founded in 1949, a blood cancer diagnosis was almost always fatal. Thanks in part to innovative research funded by LLS, survival rates have doubled, tripled and even quadrupled for blood cancer patients. Today, cancer research in one area helps across all types of cancers. One example of this is the approval of the revolutionary drug Gleevac. The 10-year survival rate for certain blood cancer patients improved from 1 in 10 to nearly 9 in 10.

We’re a small company trying to make a big difference. If you’d like to join us in the fight against cancer, please donate here or join us on Thursday at 5PM in the Boston Common.

Catherine Shannon is the Director of Finance at CMB. She’s a two time cancer survivor who is happy to say that she’ll celebrate five years in remission next May, and she looks forward to Light the Night tomorrow.

If you’ve never lived in Boston, you might not understand the spectacle that is September 1st. It’s the day that most new leases start, which means it’s the day almost every person in the city moves into a different apartment. U-Hauls crowd the narrow streets, abandoned furniture sits on the sidewalks, and new neighbors begin to pack into the halls. This year, as I watched boxes being lugged around, I couldn’t help but feel relieved that I didn't have to move. While moving itself is a chore, apartment hunting is the more challenging part of the process—should I go in for a one bed or a two bed? Should I just pay another $150 per month and get additional square footage? Or should I stay firm and stick to my original budget? And this is the most agonizing question of all: if I let this apartment go, will I regret it? The process is exhausting, and even though you know you'd make the very same choices if you were to go through it again, there is no sense of triumph in the final decision made. Why is that?

Think about it: what makes a house hunt different from the many other choices we’re faced with on a regular basis, such as buying a can of soup or a light bulb? Besides needing to deal with a real-estate agent, the key difference lies in how the choices are presented to us. In one situation, we are presented with choices sequentially (you see one house at a time), whereas in the other situation, we’re shown all the options at once (you choose a can of soup from an array of options at the store). So why does this matter? According to a study by Cassie Mogilner, Baba Shiv, and Sheena Iyengar, the way in which we are presented with choices has a considerable impact on how happy we are with the chosen option and how committed we are to that choice.

In one of the experiments conducted, researchers showed participants descriptions of five gourmet chocolates and asked them to choose the one they wanted to taste. One group of respondents (sequential choosers) was shown the chocolates one at a time, while the other group (simultaneous choosers) was shown the chocolates all at once. Once participants selected a chocolate and sampled it, they were each asked individually to complete a survey and indicate how satisfied they were with their choice.

The result? Participants who were presented with the options one at a time were less satisfied with their choice than the participants who considered all the options at once. More interestingly, “sequential choosers” were also more likely to switch to a different option when given the choice to swap for a randomly selected option about which they knew nothing, indicating lower levels of commitment among this group.

The reason? As you might expect, the regret of having passed up “better” options plays some role, but researchers found that this goes away once the chooser is allowed to pick from previously seen options. What really drives lower satisfaction among “sequential choosers” is the feeling of “hope.” According to the research, sequential choosers know that alternatives will become available in the future, so they tend to “imagine a better option, hoping it will become available.” This focus on other possible options leaves them less happy with their selection. In contrast, “simultaneous choosers” remain focused on the options in front of them, and, as a result, are more satisfied and ultimately more committed to their choice.

What does this mean for businesses? When deciding how to present your products to consumers, it is worth noting the impact that this could have on their commitment to the products. This research clearly shows that allowing consumers to evaluate all their options simultaneously (vs. one at a time) results in higher levels of satisfaction. This, in turn, impacts product returns/cancellations, customer loyalty, and advocacy for the brand.

What does this mean for market researchers? When designing concept test exercises, it is important to understand the impact that sequential vs. simultaneous presentation will have on consumer satisfaction and commitment ratings to the chosen option.

As for me, while I can’t change how options will be presented the next time I look for a house, I now understand the inherent limitation of the process. . . and that the “best one” may be the one I have in hand and not one yet to come.

Ramya Parameswaran is a Project Manager at CMB. She is passionate about consumer marketing and is always on the lookout for new insights on what drives consumer choice.

New Webinar: The New Hotel Path to Purchase: The Mobile, Social, and Online Journey – As part of CMB’s Consumer Pulse program, we asked 2,000 leisure travelers to share their journey from awareness to booking. This webinar will give insight into the role of mobile, apps, customer reviews, and social media.